Day 26: St Louis
Welcome
Yesterday we crossed into the ‘Show-Me’ state, Missouri, to play a show in the ‘Gateway to the West’, St Louis.
At this point in the tour it is getting pretty hard to do anything exciting with a continental breakfast buffet. I added some colour the beginning of my day by serving myself a bowl of oatmeal topped with dried fruit and froot loops. Alongside this I enjoyed a Light + Fit Brilliant Blueberry yoghurt.
We left Chicago on the Barrack Obama Presidential Expressway, heading southwest. Tristan was behind the wheel and had us at a fearsome clip, but nothing that the Active Lane-keeping Assist of our 2022 Mercedes Benz Sprinter couldn’t handle.
I have been receiving a lot of requests for more corn content, specifically photos of corn, and I thought it was only fitting that I post a couple more since we were travelling through the state with the second highest corn production in the US.
Illinois produces around 2.1 billion bushels of corn per year, about 15% of total US production.
After several hours we emerged from the great expanse of farmland and saw our destination, the home of the United States Chess Federation, St Louis.
We crossed the state line into Missouri, defined by the Mississippi River, and had a splendid view of the Gateway Arch, along with the historical Eads Bridge, and Martin Luther King Bridge.
Our venue was called Blueberry Hill, named after a famous railway accident on the nearby Norfolk and Western Railway Line where a derailment of seven fruit-transporting cargo cars caused a mountain of fresh blueberries to pile up on Delmar Boulevard.
The venue itself is filled with quirky décor including stuffed animals and massive collections of toys and trinkets.
It was still Jonathan’s birthday, so we continued with the celebrations after soundcheck, playing a game of cricket where we all went really easy on him. Then we played his birthday show and he was allowed to play guitar solos over all of Liz’s singing. A rare treat for a special man.
After the show we sang another fine rendition of the birthday song and again we started much too high. It sounded great, though, and we all reached the end at the same time which is the most important thing.
📷 Jess Kallen
Back at the hotel we received some very good news. Our room was equipped with the most comprehensive charging setup I have ever come across. The side table had three inbuilt 110v outlets plus two USB-A outlets, and the alarm clock had another USB-A plus the vaunted USB-C outlet. The clock also features a primary and two auxiliary displays enabling a 270° field of view in light or dark environments.
